THE Philippines’ Babylove Barbon and Gen Eslapor will begin their campaign in the FIVB Beach Volleyball World Tour Boracay Open starting Thursday, May 23 at the White House Beach Station 1 in Boracay.

The young standouts from the University of Santo Tomas beach volleyball program hope to make it to Friday’s main draw when the qualification matches start at 7:30 a.m.

The host country has four women’s teams in the main draw, as Sisi Rondina will be reunited with Bernadeth Pons in the four-day tournament.

Other Filipina pairs competing are Dij Rodriguez and Bea Tan, Jackie Estoquia and DM Demontaño, and Fiola Ceballos and Patty Orendain.

Barbon, who paired with Rondina in the Tigresses’ remarkable three-peat conquest in the UAAP last September, are among the seven women’s pairs vying for slots in tomorrow’s main draw.

Before competing in the Beach World Tour, Barbon and Eslapon emerged victorious in the BVR on Tour Dumaguete Open last month.

“The goal of the BVR national tour is to give our local players an opportunity to increase their competition level to the international level,” said BVR co-founder and tournament director Charo Soriano.

Air Force’s Ranran Abdilla and Jesse Lopez will spearhead the country’s men’s campaign, which also includes collegiate standouts James Buytrago and Krung Arbasto, and Cebu’s Mike Abria and Jade Becaldo.

“Teams have been training for this and we’ve been helping them through the BVR tours we’ve been holding,” said Soriano.

The double-gender $10,000 Boracay Open, a one-star event is the 24th men’s and 23rd women’s event for the 2018-19 FIVB World Tour. The Beach World Tour returns to the Philippines for the second time following a double-gender one-star event in Manila last year. (PR)